


The Properties of Lemons

by RobberBaroness



Category: Unknown Armies
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Don't Have to Know Canon, Gen, Lists, Magical Realism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2019-02-12 07:26:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12954291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RobberBaroness/pseuds/RobberBaroness
Summary: Why accept a lemon in exchange for telling the future?  Here are a few possible reasons.





	The Properties of Lemons

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wasuremono](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wasuremono/gifts).



> Thank you to lowereastnowhere for being my beta, and to Atlas Obscura for introducing me to the wide and mystical world of lemons.

1\. The creatures which the knowledgeable are forced to call demons exist in a state of deprivation. When they taste or smell or feel or hear, it is only by the good grace of their hosts. A simple, strong sensual experience can mean the world to one of these creatures- for instance, the puckering and tartness of a ripe lemon.

2\. Sometimes you don’t even need a real demon. Write out your conjuration with sufficiently confusing cursive script, and you can conjure forth the inner strength, ferocity and obedience of a lemon.

3\. There was a mummy found beneath a lemon grove in Mexico. She now sits in a museum, far from home. Give her a lemon to remind her of where she should be and she will cry with loss and longing (her tears will heal any wound on human flesh.)

4\. The Romans displayed their citrus fruits as symbols of wealth and status. Even today, if you encounter a being who dates back to the glory of the Roman Empire, you may be able to earn their respect through this simple display of luxury.

5\. On the Jewish festival of Sukkot, a citron- in Hebrew, an etrog- is a key part of celebration. The Ponderosa lemon is a fusion of lemon and citron, and it is as of yet unknown whether one could be used for holy purposes. Experiments have been rumored to be deadly.

6\. There is no such magickal school as lemonmancy, nor cirtomancy, nor fruitomancy. Perhaps some aesthetomancer specializing in food or cocktails might value a good lemon, but it would be such a small and silly thing to devote oneself to. However, there is said to be a family of death mages in rural California who ritually sacrifice their enemies to ensure the bounty of their lemon crop. If this is true, it would not be the first time.

7\. The lemon has been said to symbolize love and fidelity. Of course, the symbolism of plants is so complex that multiple competing systems and languages with contradictory meanings exist. For a lemon to endow its holder with love and fidelity, it must be given with intent.

8\. Taking the opposite approach, a lemon given with an intent toward sour distaste can be used offensively, making the natural acidity and caustic nature of the fruit upsettingly literal. But give such an obvious curse to one well versed in the magick arts, and it is doubtful you will live to see the lemon touch their hand.

9\. There is a woman in the south of Italy trying to channel the Mother- specifically, as the Earth Mother. Fortunately, her efforts have not yet become successful enough to draw the angry attentions of the current Godwalker. If you meet her in the lemon grove to accept her benedictions she will dress as the Virgin Mary in a pale sky blue cloth. She will pour you a glass of lemonade. You will feel loved and protected as you have not since you left the womb. Should you be foolhardy enough to steal one of the fruits of her crop without her blessing, no curse will be called down upon you, but it shall yield no juice.

10\. Lemon yellow is such a pleasant color, isn’t it? It isn’t immediately relevant, but I felt remiss in not mentioning it.

11\. Take a lemon sliced into quarters, a thimble full of blood from one of your relatives, and a copy of the short story collection _Vampires in the Lemon Grove_ by Karen Russell. Place these items in a plastic container, spit on it, and leave it in your refrigerator for a month. When you at last retrieve it, the book will tell you, without any self delusion or obfuscation, who you are and where your life is heading. (It is said this same ritual will work with an orange and the novel _The Orange Eats Creeps_ by Grace Krilanovich, but more testing is needed.)

12; Lemons grown in Sicily were for many years inextricably linked with the mafia. Clearly the fruits did not compel their farmers towards violence, but they do still contain the residue of bloodshed. With every taste of the tainted fruit, something feral inside humanity starts to awaken.

13\. GMOs- or, plants that have been genetically engineered- are controversial for a number of reasons, ranging from the reasonable to the downright wrongheaded. One reason that is rarely brought up is the number of authentic thaumaturges who own farms and gear the resulting crops toward being better ritual ingredients. Their products, which can be found in any supermarket in the United States, include grapefruits, carrots, strawberries, and- yes- lemons.

14\. The smell of a lemon can be just as mystically potent as the taste. Look about your house- look to your cleaning agents, your perfumes, your candies. Better to embrace the ever-present fruit and all it brings with it than to throw them all away.

15\. Common knowledge holds that the renaissance painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo was an early surrealist whose portraits of people composed entirely of fruit were symbolic exercises. Common knowledge is wrong. The original lemons used in his constructs are now hundreds of years old, but if found and identified would be worth a fortune. Do not bite into them- though the life has departed, they will still scream.

16\. Casanova used a hollowed-out lemon as a form of birth control in the course of his adventures channeling the Rake. Avatars who have followed in his footsteps still hold this method works better than anything prescribed by doctors. Do not believe them.

17\. Every year the capering, frolicking Fool takes over the Fête du Citron in Menton, France. Buildings are covered head to toe in citrus fruit. Bridges made of oranges and roads made of lemons spring up, even thrones and idols come into being for the duration of the festival. Any lemon that was celebrated during this time will provide an intoxicating juice of incredible alcoholic potency. They say it tastes like a happy childhood.

18\. Why tell fortunes in exchange for lemons? Consider the strange maze of the fruit when cut in half, the seeds resting where they may. It’s a better method of divination than vague affairs with cards or messy and impractical matters of bird entrails. The lemon is not a price for fortune telling. It is the means.


End file.
